


Tuesday Heartbreak

by come_slyther



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Auror Draco Malfoy, Auror Harry Potter, Auror Partners, Draco loves Jeopardy!, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Getting Together, M/M, Pining Harry Potter
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-13
Updated: 2018-11-13
Packaged: 2019-08-23 05:07:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,011
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16612493
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/come_slyther/pseuds/come_slyther
Summary: It's taken a few years, but Harry and Draco are finally firm friends. So why did Draco have to go and ruin it all by getting engaged?





	Tuesday Heartbreak

**Author's Note:**

> Another little Drarry, hope you enjoy! The title is taken from the Stevie Wonder song and the daily writing prompt was "Is there any reason why you’re getting drunk on a Tuesday afternoon?”

“Is there any reason why you’re getting drunk on a Tuesday afternoon?”

Draco Malfoy’s sharp, aristocratic voice cut through the warm, comforting haze of half a bottle of Odgen’s and Harry looked up, watching him climb gracefully from the Floo into the drawing room at Grimmauld. The last of the green flames cast a fittingly Slytherin halo around Draco as he walked over to where Harry was sprawled on the squashy, burgundy couch, one perfect silver eyebrow raised in question.

“Felt like it,” Harry mumbled. He raised the bottle to his mouth, but before he could take another sip, strong elegant fingers wrapped around his hand and smoothly wrested the whisky from him.

“While I thoroughly approve of getting completely trolleyed whenever one feels like it,” Draco said wryly, “I am compelled to ask, as your partner and friend, if you’re alright _._ ”

Harry chuckled a little despondently. The very reason Harry was intent on getting blackout drunk at 1pm on a Tuesday afternoon was that he had recently come to the conclusion that he was bloody well _in love with Draco Malfoy_. Which probably wouldn’t have been too bad except that yesterday he’d kissed the prat and Draco had shoved him off because he was _getting married_ in two weeks _._

Harry gave up trying to grab the Ogden’s and slumped down further on the sofa, trying to avoid staring at the way Draco stood with one hip cocked, the sleeves of his soft ice-blue button-down pushed up his strong, pale forearms.

They’d been in the Auror training programme together straight out of their Eighth Year at Hogwarts. It was six months in that Ron that had first extended a hand of civility to Draco, inviting him to join their weekly drinking session at the Leaky when he felt a twinge of guilt at how all the trainees had shunned Draco (“he doesn’t really seem like that much of a knob anymore”). It had been an awkward night at first, the conversation stilted. But then Ron had asked Tom behind the bar for his wizarding chess set and before Harry knew it, Ron had lost a game of chess for the first time since training began and everyone who had already been through a humiliating chess defeat at Ron’s hands (which was most of them) was toasting Draco with a flaming firewhisky.

Ron had later drunkenly told Harry that he knew what that kind of loneliness felt like, growing the sixth son with no unique talent; he wasn’t brave like Charlie, or infinitely cool like Bill, or clever like Percy, or funny and charming like the twins. Harry had protested all of those points but Ron had waved him off, his firewhisky spilling over the glass sloppily, and began lamenting the Chudley Cannon’s latest nosedive in the Quidditch league tables.

Within a few months, weekly drinking with Draco became sharing the odd lunch, or grabbing a takeaway to sustain them as they studied defensive duelling techniques. A heartfelt, if somewhat awkward, attempt at an apology from Draco had gone some way to helping the three of them move on from their past differences. But nothing had bonded Ron, Harry and Draco quite as much as their mutual horror at Hermione’s stubborn attempts to master the art of cooking. Draco had learned the hard way not to bother with politeness, when he had deigned to try the mushroom risotto Hermione had knocked up _because one should always be gracious to one’s host, Potter._ He stubbornly ate his way through a generous plate of sticky grey rice, even though both Ron and Harry had warned him about Hermione’s remarkable ability to turn the humble mushroom into a weapon of biological warfare. He’d later returned from the bathroom, pale and wan, and conceded that perhaps the risotto had been less knocked up than beaten viciously into an inedible, toxic sludge. This had spawned a competition to one-up each other in providing increasingly ridiculous excuses as to why they couldn’t eat Hermione’s cooking, culminating in Ron claiming he was vegetarian as he turned down Hermione’s hunter’s chicken to tuck into a pepperoni pizza (“Everyone knows pepperoni isn’t real meat, ‘Mione.”). Even Hermione had laughed at that one.

Harry hadn’t even been upset when he’d been partnered with Draco rather than Ron after graduating. Although it seemed at first that Draco’s shrewd, analytical mind and obsessive attention to detail was designed to clash with Harry’s tenacity and enthusiasm for getting the job done, it didn’t take long for them to realise how well they actually complemented each other: Draco slowed him down, made him dot his i’s and cross his t’s so their cases were watertight, and Harry encouraged Draco to get his nose out of the books and trust his own gut instinct. They had each other’s backs both in and out of uniform. Even Ron, who’d admitted to a small twinge of jealousy at just how good they were as a team, understood their unique dynamic and that at the heart of their friendship, it simply came down to the fact that Draco always gave Harry a fight: whether they were standing together, back to back in a room full of criminals, or shouting insults at each other and storming off to cool down.

It was Draco that Harry first told about his bisexuality, striving for a casual tone as he mentioned fancying Reuben Addison after the Unspeakable had helped them crack a dangerous creature smuggling ring. Draco, who’d been out since Eighth Year, had simply remarked that while he could certainly appreciate the blonde-haired, blue-eyed man from afar, surely Harry could choose someone better to date than the guy named for a _glorified corned beef sandwich_.

(When Harry had contested that, Draco had sniffed and added dryly “he’s a bloody Unspeakable, Harry, imagine how boring the dirty talk would be with a guy who can’t _say anything_.” “He can’t say anything about his _job_ , you prat!” “You probably have to fill out a request form in triplicate and get approval from three Heads of Department before he'd let you give him a handjob in a toilet.” “I hate you.”)

It was Harry that Draco had first told about his arranged marriage to Astoria Greengrass, three months ago. They’d been watching Jeopardy!, something Draco was ridiculously addicted to even though he seemed incapable of understanding that as an American muggle TV programme, the answers were highly unlikely to relate to the wizarding world (“The tubular leaves on this carnivorous plant give it this name for a container for pouring liquids.” “Venomous Tentacula!” “Pitcher plant is correct.” “What the _actual_ _fuck_.” “Are you seriously surprised?!”).

That day, however, Draco had been uncharacteristically quiet. When Harry had finally switched the TV off and asked him what the matter was, he’d stared down at his hands and muttered that he was getting married at the end of April. Harry had felt a squeezing sensation in his chest and he’d spared a second to wonder why that was before he mumbled a belated, stilted congratulations and asked how Draco had met this person he was signing up to be with forever. It turned out that a marriage contract had been drawn up between Draco and Astoria Greengrass before the war and the Greengrasses had reached out to Narcissa Malfoy to say they were willing to go ahead and honour it. Keen to do anything to redeem the Malfoy name and re-enter polite society, Draco’s mother sprung the news on him at their fortnightly brunch, eyes shining with an excited gleam that he seldom saw anymore, and mused that an April wedding would probably give the best light for his complexion. Draco simply hadn’t had it in him to ruin her joy.

“So you’re going to get married _in three months’ time_ even though you barely know this girl and you’re _gay for fuck’s sake,_ just because your mum is _excited about it_?!” Harry had asked incredulously, unsure why he was quite so upset but unable to reign his anger in.

But Draco, stubborn arse that he was, wouldn’t be dissuaded.

“You don’t even love each other!”

“For fuck’s sake Harry, my chances of finding someone who loves me are less than zero as it is. I’m a gay ex-Death Eater with the kind of work schedule that makes finding the time to even have a quick wank difficult!”

He’d stomped off then, leaving Harry somewhat speechless on the sofa; they hadn’t spoken again beyond polite, work-related chat until the usual team drinks at the Leaky, where Harry slid Draco a glass of the pub’s most expensive Elvish wine in apology and Draco had given his shoulder a little squeeze in acceptance.

Three months had passed quickly, and Harry had found it increasingly difficult to stomach any wedding chat. Ron, on the other hand, was full of advice, having been a groomsman at Bill, Percy and George’s weddings. Harry wasn’t sure what his issue really was; he just knew it was wrong for Draco to tie himself to someone forever just to please his mother. Harry spent January and February telling himself and anyone who asked that he was just concerned about his friend. By the end of February, however, he’d realised that what he felt for Draco was perhaps a little friendlier than was typical. And when Ron – who was steadily working his way through another pint as Harry ranted yet _again_ about Draco’s wedding – told Harry to “man up and tell him you’re in love with him”, he’d finally understood that he was well and truly fucked.

And that’s how he’d found himself kissing Draco Malfoy on his couch. He'd come over to Harry's yesterday to watch Jeopardy! and have a beer after work as usual. They were touching from shoulder to thigh and it was an exquisite torture. Harry had let his head loll back, his eyes gazing unfocusedly at the wainscoted ceiling as he tried to work out how to tell Draco he loved him.

“Harry,” Draco had said quietly after realising his incorrect answers were going un-ridiculed. “Tell me what’s wrong.”

Maybe it was the way Draco said it, or the way his skin tingled where their shoulders touched, or that he was tired after a long day writing reports, but Harry had found himself blurting out the truth.

“I don’t want you to get married.”

Draco had sighed. “I know you have these views about what marriage is, but we can’t all have that.” He shifted slightly and turned to face Harry. “You never know, I might even end up loving her.”

Harry snorted. “If she spontaneously grows a cock?”

Draco suppressed a smile before frowning again. “Why can’t you support me in this? I thought we were friends.”

Harry had swivelled his eyes to Draco’s. It struck him in that moment that Draco Malfoy was so bloody _pretty._ His eyes, flinty cold for so many years, were warm and light and open. His corn-silk hair was teased into a casually elegant quiff that flattered his high, regal cheekbones, patrician nose, pointy chin and small pink mouth. Harry found his gaze drawn to that mouth, rosebud lips that looked so _soft_ when they weren’t sneering.

Before he knew what he was doing, he had leaned forward and pressed his mouth to Draco’s. Harry’s heart stopped for a second as panic overtook him – _what the fuck did I do that for –_ before he felt a returning pressure as Draco kissed him back. His hand came up to Draco’s nape, fingers twisting into the baby-fine hairs there, thumb tracing the edges of his jaw. He felt a hand ghost along his hip and he turned towards Draco fully, who wasted no time in pulling Harry onto his lap. His arm clamped around Harry’s waist as he moved his mouth down the column of Draco’s neck and sucked hard on his collarbone. The low groan that left Draco’s mouth sent all the blood in Harry’s body rushing south, his erection straining painfully against his jeans.

Just as things were getting interesting, Draco had stiffened up – not quite in the way Harry would have liked – and wrenched himself away. He moved to the end of the sofa, hair mussed up, a wild pink flush on his cheeks, breathing as if he’d running a marathon.

“What are we doing?” he had gasped, running a hand over his mouth and rubbing his jaw distractedly. Harry felt an urge to crawl over to him and lick and bite and nuzzle that stupid perfect jaw. “We’re friends! We’re partners. _Merlin fuck_ _I’m getting married in two weeks._ ”

He stood up, flashing a sliver of impossibly pale stomach where his shirt had ridden up. Harry had scrambled up too, pausing to sway slightly as the alcohol he’d drunk hit him all at once, but Draco had already grabbed his wand and disapparated with a spin of his heel. Harry had stared forlornly at the spot where Draco’d been before slumping back onto the couch, where he had eventually fallen into a fitful sleep. He’d woken up around noon feeling absolutely shite. Wandlessly summoning the Ogden’s from the kitchen, he proceeded to spend the rest of the afternoon trying to drink enough to fill the weird, hollow feeling in his chest.

And now Draco Malfoy was standing in front of him, acting as if nothing had happened yesterday, and Harry felt a sudden burst of anger.

“Go away Draco,” he growled. “I don’t want to talk to you right now.”

Draco sighed and sat down on the coffee table in front of Harry. “Is this about yesterday?”

“No,” Harry muttered sullenly, even though they both knew it was. “Why are you even here? Don’t you have a _wedding_ to plan?”

Draco chuckled. “If you think I got a single say in anything wedding-related, you obviously don’t know my mother.” He cleared his throat delicately. “Besides, I had a chat with Ron last night.”

Harry groaned inwardly, gauging from Draco’s tone of voice exactly what Ron might had told him. _Stupid loud-mouthed Weasley._

“He made me realise what an absolute prat I was being.” Draco looked down at his hands. “Told me that I’d spent the last three months caring more about your reaction to my wedding than about the event itself, and that no man would – and I quote – _go into that much detail about a snog with a friend if he wasn’t completely gone on him_. And that it would be a disservice to us both if I went ahead with the wedding. _And_ that no person in their right mind runs out on Harry bloody Potter.” He huffed out a little laugh. “Hermione also handily pointed out that if all my mother wanted was to restore some honour to the Malfoy name, surely there could be no better way than for her successful, devilishly attractive Auror son to date the saviour of all wizardkind.”

_Brilliant loud-mouthed Weasleys._

Harry swallowed tentatively. “There’s no way Hermione called you devilishly attractive.”

Draco grinned. “No, you're right. She offered me a homemade scone and I think she meant it as a threat this time.” He reached out and twined his fingers with Harry’s. “I spoke to Astoria this morning and we agreed to nullify the contract. She seemed quite relieved if I’m honest, said that _Astoria Malfoy_ just didn’t sound quite right. She’s going to keep the courting gifts I gave her and I’ve transferred quite a handsome sum over to her parents, to compensate for the cost of the wedding and for voiding the contract.”

Harry felt his heart jump up into his throat. “And your mum?”

“She’ll come around.” Draco’s smile faltered a little. “But it doesn’t matter. This is what I want. I shouldn’t have run off yesterday but I was…well, scared I guess. You’ve become one of my best friends over the last couple of years and I didn’t want to ruin that. It took Ron telling me that he wished he’d acted a bit sooner with Hermione to make me realise how much I really wanted to try this.”

He squeezed Harry’s hand softly. “I really want to try _us_.”

Harry sat up and reached forward to caress Draco’s jaw softly, his eyes roaming hungrily across the other man’s face.

“What about work?”

“We can speak to Robbards when we’re back in on Thursday and put in for a transfer.” Draco gave a cheeky grin, bringing out the dimple in his left cheek. “I mean, I want you to watch my back not my _backside_ when we’re working.”

Harry pushed him with a laugh. “You’re such a prat.” Then he pulled him onto his lap and shoved his nose into the juncture where neck met shoulder, the scent of bergamot and citrus and musk filling the hollow in his chest until Harry felt like he might burst from happiness. He mouthed at the soft skin, the very tip of his tongue drawling swirls that made Draco sigh breathily and press a kiss to his cheek.

“You smell like a pub,” Draco sniffed after a minute. “You need a sobering potion and a long shower. Then I reckon we should grab some Chinese and have a Jeopardy! marathon. I’m in the mood for chow mein and a snuggle.”

Harry smiled. “I love you, you know,” he mumbled into his neck.

He felt Draco’s hands tighten around him. “Be that as it may, you’re still paying for dinner.”

With an affectionate nip to the neck which made Draco issue an honest-to-goodness squeak, Harry reluctantly let go of him to go wash up. He paused in the doorway and looked back at Draco, who’d already grabbed the remote control and had his eyes glued to the TV. He turned to walk away when he heard Draco call out.

“Oi Potter! I love you too. Now hurry the fuck up so we can snog on the couch again.”

Harry grinned and _accioed_ a sobering potion. Tuesday was promising to be a most excellent day.


End file.
